


Moments (Trini Remembers)

by Ressick



Series: A Ranger's Work Is Never Done [3]
Category: Power Rangers (2017)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-04
Updated: 2017-05-04
Packaged: 2018-10-28 03:54:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,874
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10823199
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ressick/pseuds/Ressick
Summary: Trini has certain memories that stick out in her mind regarding Angel Grove.  Here some of them are.





	Moments (Trini Remembers)

**Author's Note:**

> I'm terrible at sticking to a linear timeline while writing, so here's a sort-of future fic. Sorry about the present tense. There's a decent chance some of these moments will be fleshed out in other stories.

 

0.

The back of the family minivan is cramped with suitcases and duffel bags packed around Trini, her brothers snoring in the middle seat, her mother silent as she drives, and her father behind them with the moving truck.Angel Grove, as they pass the city limits, looks like every other damn town they’ve lived in over the span of Trini’s life.Never for long, but boring while they’re there.One donut shop, a couple gas stations, a high school that’s a monolithic monument to the hell that is gym class and finding a safe place to eat lunch and getting your locker defaced and a wide, uncreative variety of slurs in the hallway and anything related to algebra.Angel Grove High takes a full six weeks to even notice she exists, and it starts with being shoved against the lockers.Joy.

 

1.

They smell of sweat and rock dust and lake water.Kim has a growing bruise across her side and Trini can feel the deep scrape on her leg bleed sluggishly into her sock.They’re the last ones left in the pit, Tommy having limped off for a hot shower in the one part of crew quarters not destroyed in the crash and the boys to tinker with Billy’s latest alien-tech-influenced-gadget.Kim kneels by her and takes the last of her water bottle to rinse the worst of the dirt from Trini’s wound.So close, Trini can see the sweat dripping down Kim’s creased forehead.When their eyes meet, time seems to stop and then Trini feels Kim’s lips on hers and it’s everything she’s dreamed of since she got tossed off a cliff by the woman kissing her.

 

2.

Telling the rest of the team is easy enough, as it seemed to be the night for it.Zack’s mom is asleep and they’re all in the tiny trailer’s living area, which doubles as Zack’s bedroom.The other Rangers bring pizza and snacks and drinks and it’s more than enough to feed Zack from the leftovers for days.Trini knows she’s shaking, knows Kim can _feel_ her shaking where her brand new girlfriend is pressed up against her on the worn couch, and the words just won’t pass her lips.Coming out has never been a positive experience for her, and even her half-assed coming out at their first Ranger Bonfire left her tender and shaking for nearly a week under her mask of surly indifference.

Before Trini can get the words out, before Kim can say anything, Billy turns to Jason and says, “Should we tell them we’re romantically involved now, Jase?”Trini feels her jaw drop, and hears Tommy’s infectious giggles before those cut off abruptly.She turns, and Zack has pulled their newest teammate into a passionate kiss. 

Kim slings an arm around her shoulders, presses her lips to Trini’s neck, and murmurs, “Well they took the wind out of our sails, didn’t they?”Trini just bursts into laughter.

 

3.

College is not something Trini really thought about terribly deeply besides as a method to escape her parents’ house.But being a Ranger changes everything.An out of town school is no longer an option, so it’s Angel Grove State College for every Ranger attempting higher education - herself, Kim, Billy, and Tommy.The students all get part-time jobs while Jason goes to work full-time at the docks to his father’s absolute disappointment, and Zack gets a job in construction.Between the six of them, they manage to afford a four-bedroom rental on the opposite side of town from the college for their second semester, enough for all of them and Zack’s mom, who is the only parent that they purposefully break Rule #3 for (though Billy’s mom finds out later). 

The day they move in involves too many trips back and forth to their parents’ homes, a borrowed pickup truck to transport furniture, Zack’s mom directing everything and everyone from a comfortable chair on the front porch while Billy and Zack spend most of the day in the first floor full bath, retrofitting it (with the landlord’s grudging permission) to be as accessible as possible (read: just barely) for her.Her small bedroom is supposed to be a den, but they make it work.They make everything about the house work for them, and Trini’s parents are so uninvolved in her life that they never set foot inside, so the fact that her shared bedroom with Kim has one queen-sized bed from Ikea in it, goes unnoticed.Her brothers, picked up from school after most of the construction is done, promise not say anything and they may be just kids but she trusts them.Evening arrives and along with it Billy’s mom, Jason’s sister, Tommy’s aunts, and Kim’s parents.They all cram into the living room - bare of much of anything besides two secondhand couches, an unassembled entertainment center, and boxes.Parents on the couches, kids on the floor, they eat takeout and chat and Trini looks around at her crazy new family and something settles inside her.A rare, full smile spreads across her face and Kim presses a kiss to her lips, and everything feels _right_.

 

4.

Her parents stop all contact and support when they realize that Kimberly isn’t just her roommate.As if they weren’t completely obvious for more than three years, as if her little brothers don’t sometimes call Kim their sister-in-law within their parents’ hearing.But no contact means no money for school, and Trini works but not that much.Even with the rest of the Rangersstretching to split her rent between them, it’s not enough, and financial aid takes into account her parents’ income so that’s a bust.

Trini packs the few things left in the bedroom at her parents’ house before they can trash her things, and they’re partway through the spring semester of their junior years and even working full time all summer, Trini frets about not coming up with enough to pay for her senior year.The week of spring break, Kim gets down on one knee, Kim offers up an _engagement ring_ , a thicker than normal platinum ring with tiny chips of pink and yellow sapphire inlaid flat into the band.It’s eminently practical for both a Power Ranger and Trini’s queer aesthetic. 

They’ve talked about marriage, fleetingly, in those post-coital moments where they lazily plan their future.But to see the ring glitter in Kim’s hand, as they’re all crammed in the tiny backyard of the house they share, their friends surrounding them, burgers on the grill and Zack’s mom ensconced in her comfy lawn chair enjoying the sun, it’s more than Trini ever could have expected.The part of her that was waiting for everything to collapse around her, _that_ part is shocked.

But she nods and tears fall down her cheeks and she kneels to throw her arms around her fiancee and kiss her, ignoring Zack’s cheers and Tommy’s sniffles and Billy’s clapping and Zack’s mom laughing as Jason beams.

 

4.

Her little brothers, just entering middle school, walk her down the aisle at her wedding.It’s in Kim’s parents’ backyard, a tiny ceremony with just the absolute essential people attending and a civil ceremony performed by a justice of the peace Kim’s father knows.Her little brothers, in their dress pants and guayaberas, walk arm in arm with her, escort her to her soon-to-be-wife.Kim is a vision in a deep red saree at the end of the aisle, and Trini doesn’t even trip over her long white wedding dress, probably because of the brand-new Converse she’s wearing with it.Her teammates are their wedding party, and they all crack up at the twins mock-glaring at Kim as they hand Trini over to her.She kisses both their cheeks before shooing them to their seats, their teen egos making them blush at their sister’s affection.Kim’s dad is still there from escorting his daughter down the aisle, and he kisses both their foreheads before sitting beside Kim’s mom, who’s already crying.The ceremony is short, and simple, and before Trini knows it, she’s wearing a wedding band next to her engagement ring and the justice is telling her to kiss her _wife_.So she does.

 

5.

Kim’s parents put them up in a hotel for their wedding night.With hoots and hollers and Zack having tied a string of tin cans to the back of their ancient yellow Subaru, they drive off after dancing for hours with each other, their friends, and the family that managed to attend - Kim’s parents and about half her extended family, Trini’s brothers and three favorite cousins and her abuela, two dozen others via skype and facetime.Someone put Billy in charge of the music so it was a decent mix of all their favorites that were danceable - none of Trini’s hard rock or metal, but plenty of reggaeton and bhangra and top 40 hits across five languages.The music is still playing in the backyard as they drive off to the cheers of their wedding guests, and Kim links her hand with Trini’s over the gearshift.They’re just driving through Angel Grove to the chain hotel down by their college, but it feels like driving into their future, together.

 

6.

The actual labor is a blur of pain and pressure and screaming and bending the metal of her hospital bed when her obgyn’s back was turned - though Kim distracted the doctor while Zack bent it back into shape.She wonders when she became That Person to want both her wife and her best friend in with her while she pushes a watermelon out her vagina (and _damn_ , even if having sex with her wife didn’t actually get her pregnant, _by God_ Kim’s never touching her again), but it turned out to be a good decision and only hospital regulations keep the rest of the Rangers, plus Kim’s parents and her brothers, out in the waiting room.

But that first moment the doctor puts their baby on her chest, screaming and covered in gross fluids and absolutely perfect, Trini weeps unabashedly as Kim curls around them both on the hospital bed.Her wife presses careful, devout kisses to their baby’s head, pressing her forehead to Trini’s, whispering _I love you_ over and over again.

 

7.

She’s a Power Ranger and a wife and a mother and she helps run a small business with her team, and she’s a _badass_ but still cries when her baby (“not a baby, mama!”) crosses the stage for kindergarten graduation, adorable in her little cap and gown and beaming, waving at her mothers and grandparents (Kim’s folks, and Zack’s mom, still holding on) and assorted uncles and aunts and cousins all crowded in to see her move on to the first grade.Trini’s coin means she still heals quickly, she still moves like the teenager she was when she first morphed, but she’s got fifteen years of fighting to save the world, to protect her family, under her belt.She’s got years of loving her wife, and years of having a family closer than blood, and years of being happy most of the time, and none of it was anything like she expected.


End file.
